NEWPORT NEWS - John ``Til'' Hazel, a Northern Virginia lawyer and businessman, will be the keynote speaker at Christopher Newport University's commencement May 9.

Hazel, chairman of the Virginia Business-Higher Education Council, is scheduled to speak at 10 a.m. on the campus lawn. CNU's Board of Visitors will grant Hazel an honorary doctor of laws degree in recognition of his commitment to education in Virginia.

The board will also grant an honorary doctor of humane letters degree posthumously to singer Ella Fitzgerald. The honorary degree is given to people who have made significant contributions in the areas of the arts and humanities.

Fitzgerald's son, Ray Brown Jr., is scheduled to accept the degree. The presentation falls at the end of the week-long Ella Fitzgerald Music Festival and Workshop, which is being held at CNU May 3-9.

CNU President Paul Trible said 680 students will graduate this spring.

If confirmed, Mies, 53, will become commander in chief of the U.S. Strategic Command at Offutt Air Force Base, Neb., which is in charge of the planning for potential nuclear confrontation. Its forces also do analytical studies for strategic nuclear policy and arms control matters.

Its current commander, Air Force Gen. Eugene Habiger, 59, has applied to retire effective Aug. 1, the Pentagon said in a separate statement.

VIMS OPEN HOUSE SCHEDULED TODAY

GLOUCESTER POINT - If you've ever wondered what goes on at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, today is your chance to find out.

VIMS is holding an open house at its Gloucester Point campus from noon to 5 p.m. Scientists and students will open their labs and invite the public in to look around, see some demonstrations and ask questions.

The open house will include the oyster disease laboratory, the seagrass lab, the aquaculture center and the institute's collection of fish specimens. The VIMS aquarium and touch tank will also be open.

The open house is part of the institute's ongoing celebration of the International Year of the Ocean.

LAWMAKERS SELECT NN LAWYER FOR BENCH

RICHMOND - The General Assembly has appointed Charles P. Tench to fill a juvenile judgeship in Newport News.

Tench is a lawyer with the Newport News firm Jones, Blechman, Woltz and Kelly. He is a former law clerk for Newport News Circuit Court.

He will replace Edward L. Hubbard, who was appointed to a circuit judgeship the legislature's regular session created this year to deal with the city's growing caseload.

Tench was one of three judges appointed by the General Assembly Friday. The House of Delegates rejected a candidate from Northern Virginia.

WOMAN IS CHARGED WITH STABBING MAN

NEWPORT NEWS - Police arrested a woman suspected of stabbing a friend in the back at her home Friday night.

LaKeshia Davis, 20, of the 500 block of 19th Street was charged with malicious wounding.

Officer Mia Phillips, a police spokeswoman, said the stabbing occurred during an argument at Davis' home. The victim, a male acquaintance, was leaving when Davis picked up a kitchen knife and threw it at the man's back, Phillips said.

The victim was treated at the scene, Phillips said.

BOY, 13 ACCUSED OF CHILD SEX ABUSE

JAMES CITY - A 13-year-old James City boy has been charged with sodomizing a 5-year-old boy in his neighborhood, police said.

The victim's mother told police that the 13-year-old came over to play with her children Monday afternoon, according to a search warrant filed Thursday in Williamsburg-James City County Circuit Court.

The sexual offense occurred while the suspect and victim were in the victim's bedroom supposedly playing a video game, the search warrant says.

But one of the victim's siblings told their mother that the 13-year-old and 5-year-old were exposing themselves, the search warrant says. Questioned by his mother later, the 5-year-old said the older boy had performed oral and anal sex on him.

The 13-year-old was charged with sodomizing another neighborhood boy in 1996, the search warrant says.

Police would not say what the outcome of that case was or identify the neighborhood, except to say it's in the upper part of the county. The 13-year-old is now being held in juvenile detention, police said.

NN MAN MAY BE BODY IN BURNED CAR

SMITHFIELD, N.C. - Johnston County sheriff's investigators are awaiting medical records to establish the identity of a man whose charred body was found in a burned station wagon at the end of a dirt path.

The station wagon was registered to James Franklin Brim, 59, of Newport News, Capt. Kenneth Eatman said Friday.

According to The Associated Press, Brim had been reported missing for about two weeks when his station wagon and the body inside were found in a wooded area near a homeless shelter north of Clayton, about 30 miles east of Raleigh.

Authorities are treating the death as a homicide but have not ruled out the possibility that Brim took his own life.

Brim lived in an apartment in the 600 block of 74th Street and worked at a coin laundry on Jefferson Avenue.

Two surveyors found the burned vehicle April 17. Detectives believe the car and remains were there six or seven days.